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Collision With History: The Search for John F. Kennedy's PT 109
Michael Hamilton Morgan writes on the PT 109
It's about 2 a.m., August 2, 1943. Lt. John F. Kennedy squints into the fog and black while at the wheel of PT 109, idling in the Blackett Strait off Gizo in the Solomon Islands. His orders are to attack the Tokyo Express resupplying Japanese installations.... He and his young crew are ready, but handicapped by darkness and fog.... Suddenly, only 300 yards away, a black shape looms...traveling without lights and at high speed. Only seconds before impact...the ship is identified as a Japanese destroyer, the Amagiri. The much larger craft slices through the hull of PT 109, cutting the 80-foot wooden-hulled boat in two. Several of the crew are injured, one critically. The crew takes refuge on the larger section that remains afloat until dawn. Then all are into the water, and Lt. Kennedy begins the series of epic swims that will save his crew and earn him a place in history.
Forty years after his death and 60 years after his first collision with history in the South Pacific, John F. Kennedy and his story still inspire readers. In Collision with History, JFK's heroic efforts to save the 11-man crew of PT 109 are brought to vivid life, interwoven with a comprehensive history of PT boats and the World War II campaign in the Solomon Islands. Combining renowned explorer Robert Ballard's account of his search for the wreckage of PT 109 with survivor accounts and Kennedy family members' personal recollections, this companion volume to the major National Geographic television event is a moving introduction to the young war hero who would later become president.
It's about 2 a.m., August 2, 1943. Lt. John F. Kennedy squints into the fog and black while at the wheel of PT 109, idling in the Blackett Strait off Gizo in the Solomon Islands. His orders are to attack the Tokyo Express resupplying Japanese installations.... He and his young crew are ready, but handicapped by darkness and fog.... Suddenly, only 300 yards away, a black shape looms...traveling without lights and at high speed. Only seconds before impact...the ship is identified as a Japanese destroyer, the Amagiri. The much larger craft slices through the hull of PT 109, cutting the 80-foot wooden-hulled boat in two. Several of the crew are injured, one critically. The crew takes refuge on the larger section that remains afloat until dawn. Then all are into the water, and Lt. Kennedy begins the series of epic swims that will save his crew and earn him a place in history.
Forty years after his death and 60 years after his first collision with history in the South Pacific, John F. Kennedy and his story still inspire readers. In Collision with History, JFK's heroic efforts to save the 11-man crew of PT 109 are brought to vivid life, interwoven with a comprehensive history of PT boats and the World War II campaign in the Solomon Islands. Combining renowned explorer Robert Ballard's account of his search for the wreckage of PT 109 with survivor accounts and Kennedy family members' personal recollections, this companion volume to the major National Geographic television event is a moving introduction to the young war hero who would later become president.
- GenresHistoryNonfiction
200 pages, Hardcover
First published November 26, 2002
61 people want to read
About the author
Robert D. Ballard
76 books169 followersRobert Duane Ballard (born June 30, 1942 in Wichita, Kansas) is a former commander in the United States Navy and an oceanographer who is most noted for his work in underwater archaeology. He is most famous for the discoveries of the wrecks of the RMS Titanic in 1985, the battleship Bismarck in 1989, and the wreck of the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown in 1998. Most recently he discovered the wreck of John F. Kennedy's PT-109 in 2003 and visited the Solomon Islander natives who saved its crew. Ballard is also great-grandson of American Old West lawman Bat Masterson.
from wikipedia.org
see also
http://literati.net/Ballard/
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/fie...
http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/pa...
from wikipedia.org
see also
http://literati.net/Ballard/
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/fie...
http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/pa...
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
November 24, 2020
It is very good.Im also glad he said he wasn’t going to stop exploring! I like the story about JFK’s coconut
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 26, 2023
Given his chronic back problems, John F. Kennedy could have avoided combat in World War II. However, he pleaded with his very influential father to find a doctor willing to certify him healthy enough to serve in a combat role. After his basic officer training, Kennedy was given command of a patrol-torpedo (PT) boat with the designation PT109.
Their assignment was to patrol the area that was known as the “Tokyo Express,” where fast convoys of Japanese ships traveled down to the Solomon Islands at night to reinforce and resupply the Japanese garrison there. One night, a Japanese destroyer collided with PT 109, cutting it into pieces, killing some of the crew and sinking it.
Left for dead, the crew of the PT 109 had to fend for themselves. Swimming to an island, they managed to survive until they encountered some natives of the Solomons. After some communication, the survivors of the PT 109 were rescued. Decades later a search time utilized high tech gear to search the area for the remains of the PT 109 and they managed to identify a torpedo tube on the sea floor as from the PT 109.
This video has two main tracks. The first references the events leading up to the destruction of PT 109 in August of 1943 as well as the aftermath. Later footage is of a meeting between two of the Solomon Islanders that rescued the PT 109 survivors with a member of the Kennedy family. The other track follows the research team as they try to locate the wreckage of PT 109.
It is an interesting story, for the destruction of PT 109 and the conduct of Kennedy in the aftermath likely transformed him into presidential material. Edward Kennedy, brother of John Kennedy says as much when interviewed. This is a worthy item for viewing in history classes through all educational levels.
Their assignment was to patrol the area that was known as the “Tokyo Express,” where fast convoys of Japanese ships traveled down to the Solomon Islands at night to reinforce and resupply the Japanese garrison there. One night, a Japanese destroyer collided with PT 109, cutting it into pieces, killing some of the crew and sinking it.
Left for dead, the crew of the PT 109 had to fend for themselves. Swimming to an island, they managed to survive until they encountered some natives of the Solomons. After some communication, the survivors of the PT 109 were rescued. Decades later a search time utilized high tech gear to search the area for the remains of the PT 109 and they managed to identify a torpedo tube on the sea floor as from the PT 109.
This video has two main tracks. The first references the events leading up to the destruction of PT 109 in August of 1943 as well as the aftermath. Later footage is of a meeting between two of the Solomon Islanders that rescued the PT 109 survivors with a member of the Kennedy family. The other track follows the research team as they try to locate the wreckage of PT 109.
It is an interesting story, for the destruction of PT 109 and the conduct of Kennedy in the aftermath likely transformed him into presidential material. Edward Kennedy, brother of John Kennedy says as much when interviewed. This is a worthy item for viewing in history classes through all educational levels.
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November 1, 2023Very exciting Book. I am fascinated with the Kennedy family and underwater archeology.
June 9, 2015
Coffee-table history of Kennedy's crash of the PT109 during WWII. Good photography and high-level narrative history, nothing earth-shattering. This makes good background reading for Homer Hickam's fiction "The Ambassador's Son", which see reviewed here, and in fact with this book published in 2002 and Hickam's in 2005 it seems that some of Hickam's historical material may have come from here.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews